Ray Family Update October 2023

Dear Praying Friends,

I tend to strive to get much done by creating and following to-do lists; however, there are times when there is so much to do that I feel like a ball in a pinball machine, being tossed from one high priority need to another without ever truly feeling as though I have accomplished anything. Likewise, there are times when the needs are bigger than what I can accomplish or obtain, and I find myself very overwhelmed. While it is so easy to preach to others about the need for faith, it can be so difficult to exercise it in your own life. One would think that twenty-plus years of preaching and sixteen-plus years of pastoring would have grown me up enough to not be so vulnerable to the things that plague others, but I am truly no different than the people to whom I minister. On one hand, this makes me grateful to understand their struggles; but, on the other hand, I am disappointed in myself to not be further along. A dear preacher once warned me that I had turned myself into a pressure cooker by all the self-assigned expectations and that I had better learn to fully rest in the Lord.

I think part of my struggle is in finding the balance between “Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God” (2 Corinthians 3:5) and “his grace which was bestowed upon me was not in vain; but I laboured more abundantly than they all” (1 Corinthians 15:10). Maybe the key to the whole thing is found at the end of that last verse which says, “yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.” I feel so ashamed not to have grasped and mastered these truths. If it is safe to confess one’s faults to others, and it seems as though it is (James 5:16), one of mine is that I struggle to do God’s work in the strength of God’s Spirit and by accessing God’s grace to accomplish it. This troubles me most when I read “without faith it is impossible to please him” (Hebrews 11:6). Brethren, pray for me!

If you would have asked me just over twenty years ago to rank my foes from the most dreaded and harmful to the ministry to those which could cause the least amount of harm or damage, I would no doubt have ranked them quite differently than how I would do so today. Back in the day, I used to give Satan much more airtime and credit than what I would now. In fact, he likely would have ranked at the top. I think the moment I learned that he is not omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent, my mind was changed. Now, I would have to predict that self is the greatest foe that any of us face. Beyond that, I would have to sadly say that I get far more grief from the brethren than I do from the unsaved and unbelieving. What a time it is going to be when we drop off our flesh to rise and meet our Saviour and when the brethren will finally stop looking for petty and frivolous things over which to fight! Until then, I need to worry about my own problem of “little faith” (Matthew 6:30).

Update on the Work

Many of you who take the time to read our updates each month do so because you love and pray for our family and church. We are beyond grateful and we are humbled by the care you invest in us. As such, we often provide you with details that seem irrelevant or insignificant to the average person in the world, whether saved or lost. We share these things with you in hopes that you will join us in bearing the burdens before the Lord and to offer accountability for what we do with the offerings we receive from God’s people, both locally and elsewhere.

We just completed a reprint of So You Want to Lose Your Salvation. This booklet was written by Pastor Reagan to show the fallacy of the teaching that one can lose his salvation. Brother Jonathan Judy, our assistant pastor, formatted the booklet, worked to get the cover redesigned, and got it to press. The Little Maid Who Saved a Captain is currently at the printer and should be back to us around the end of November. A redesign and reprint of a tract called The Disappearing Bible will soon be ready to go to the printer, but we will put it on hold until we can build up our publications account. The same is true for a book I coauthored with Brother James Knox on proper attire for Bible-believing Christians. I am nearly finished with a seven-year Sunday School curriculum, but that will likely only be made available for digital downloads. Speaking of digital downloads, we hope to have our publications site up and running soon where you will be able to download complete notes for a survey of Bible Doctrines, Bible History, Colossians and Philemon, Dispensationalism, First Timothy, Hebrews, How to Study the Bible, the Epistle of James, the New Testament Church, Philippians, Psalms (still in progress), Revelation, the epistles of John, First Peter, Lamentations, Second Peter and Jude, and Thessalonians. Additionally, I have started writing the next four-volume set (a companion to Daily Strength) that will focus on learning the doctrines of the Bible, but hopefully in a practical way. I am currently unsure how these will be made available.

Simultaneous to the above works, we have started again to work on our YouTube channel and other resources for publishing preaching, teaching, and music. We continue to (and will continue to) stream our services only for those who have subscribed to see them, but we are editing and posting archived content as much as possible to our YouTube channel as well as an Apple podcast channel. The amount of time and attention to detail this requires is astounding, but the feedback we receive leads us to believe that people are getting help from this ministry. It is our hope that we will be able to proceed on the next phase of our building project in the near future and this will upgrade all of our cameras, microphones, and speakers to capture far more quality content than what we are currently able to capture.

Speaking of the building project, we are currently on hold. Although our attendance is slowly creeping upward, our offerings are trending the opposite. We have a good number of young couples and elderly folks and I know both groups are being devastated by the current economic situation. As a pastor, it is hard to find the balance of being sympathetic toward people’s struggles and yet challenging them to purpose in their hearts to give and cheerfully follow through (2 Corinthians 9:7). Through the years, many of you have helped us and for that we are SO THANKFUL! We have always attempted to serve God beyond our means and, to date, He has not failed us. To some degree, this is why I opened this letter the way that I did. I need God’s help to know what to do for Him and when to do it! I need God’s provisions in order to do so! I need to stop lying awake at night worrying about it all and trying to figure out how to make it all work and make sense. I NEED FAITH!

Update on our Schedule

We have greatly cut back on our travels over the last few months. Some of this is just the way things fall but some of it was deliberate in order to be home to get some projects accomplished for the local ministry. We have a bit of a busy season on the horizon beginning with Bear Trail Baptist Church in Cana, Virginia (December 27-29), followed by Northstar Baptist Church in McMillan, Michigan (January 13-14), and closing out with The BIBLE Baptist Church in Deland, Florida (January 17-19). As a bit of a boneheaded mistake, I booked meetings around the time when my wife and I should be celebrating our twenty-fifth wedding anniversary. NOT GOOD! I pray that we can get away sometime before or after these meetings and that my wife will not see it as a reflection of how I feel about her or our marriage. My life would be sad and lonely without her and I cannot even fathom who or what I would be had God not gifted me with my spunky and sweet (sometimes just seconds apart) wife. It is not a cliché...she is my best friend! Pray with me that I can make her feel special. I need all the help I can get :-).